Table For One
by Ilanala
Summary: Alone on Caprica, Helo eats and tries not to think.


Helo never would have believed that he would one day look back fondly on the rations doled out aboard Galactica, but compared to the slop he'd managed to scrounge up on Caprica since running out of protein bars, he imagined they would taste like the finest in Geminon cuisine.

He was currently shoveling some goop that vaguely resembled chicken noodle soup into his mouth, hoping that if he ate it as quickly as possible, his taste buds might not have a chance to notice that it was downright revolting. On top of that, even with the anti-radiation meds, something about this planet in its current state seemed to make him queasy, but he shoved the stuff down his throat anyway. If he was going to be able to keep going, he needed food, or at least something vaguely resembling it.

It seemed almost silly to be forcing himself to eat. He woke up every day expecting that he wouldn't see sundown, and even if he kept surviving and found a way off the planet and came across some ship that hadn't been destroyed and managed to evade the Cylons and find a safe place to settle...well, the point was that the odds were very much against him living much longer, so eating and hiding and fighting the Cylons he came across all seemed pretty pointless.

The fact of the matter was, the only reason he was doing it all was because he had nothing else to do. It was completely contrary to his nature to sit down and wait to die, so he kept fighting and let himself pretend that his fate hadn't been decided the second Sharon had agreed to leave him behind.

To tell the truth, he wasn't entirely sure why he was still alive. He'd parted from the crowd of survivors as soon as the Raptor was out of sight (they weren't very pleased with him for letting Baltar go, or for shooting one of their number, or just for not being able to save them), and he hadn't seen a single living human being since. Military training or no, it didn't make sense that he should be the only one still alive.

It was almost as though someone was looking out for him, but he wasn't about to believe that the Cylons cared enough about the fate of a lowly lieutenant to spare him when they had mercilessly destroyed entire ships, entire planets full of people. He wasn't above pride, but he highly doubted there was anything that made him special enough to be left alone. No, his survival could only be attributed to good training, an enormous amount of good luck and a natural stubbornness that wouldn't allow him to give up not matter how impossible survival seemed, and it was silly to think otherwise.

Like any good soldier, he'd learned that it's usually best not to ask questions, so he didn't think much about why he alone, it seemed, had survived the devastation. He didn't think too far ahead and wonder how he could get off the planet, or what he would do next if he managed to. He didn't try to understand why he was still fighting a battle that he probably had no chance of winning. He just did it and took some comfort in the fact that at least he could go down fighting like he'd always dreamed of doing.

For now, he just ate the unpleasant mixture that passed for soup and distracted himself from such contemplation with thoughts of Galactica. He could imagine people gathering in the mess hall for a meal: Sharon and Starbuck and...who else would be there now? He and Sharon had seen most of the attack squadron blown out of the sky. The CAG was dead, and Jolly and probably most of the other pilots Helo had served with.

He didn't even know whether the Galactica had survived, but he had to believe she had. If he couldn't even resign himself to the fact that he was probably doomed, he wasn't about to accept that his ship was already gone. Somewhere out there, the old man was leading his ship against the Cylons, making them pay for what they had done to the human race.

It was a silly, childish thought. Helo had great faith in the ships of the Colonial Fleet, but he'd seen first-hand what the Cylons could do, both to a squadron of Vipers and to an entire planet. He wasn't fool enough to believe that even the great Commander Adama, hero to the Twelve Colonies and all those who served under him, could defeat them easily. And even if he or someone else did beat the Cylons, nothing could bring back the millions, probably billions of people who had already died. It was a miserable and probably hopeless situation, but he'd never learned to give up, and he wasn't going to start now.

Helo slurped down the last of his soup, pushing the unpleasant thoughts aside. He rinsed the bowl off in the seemingly ceaseless rain and shoved it into his pack. He tilted his head back to drink the rain; it tasted foul and probably contained all sorts of unpleasant things, but drinking it couldn't hurt much more than being soaked in it all the time, and he was thirsty.

It was time to move; the Cylons would find him if he sat still for too long, and it was easier and safer to run than to fight them directly. It might not make a difference in the long run, but he didn't care. Whatever might be happening out in space or elsewhere on Caprica, whatever might happen to him when his luck ran out, he wasn't dead yet, and he was going to do his best to see that he stayed that way.


End file.
